Roger on Running: Who Runs Running?

Who runs running? What kind of overall international structure is there? What quality standards, what rules, watchdogs, or courts of justice? No, wait! Don’t hit the remote! The answers affect you, even if you’re a modest local charity runner. If you’re engaged in any way at an elite level, they impact how you live your life.

If you want your next race to have an accurately measured course; if you want a race that welcomes women, wheelchairs, and walkers; if you want good medical attendance in case of problems; if you care whether your entry fee goes to race organization, charity, or to profit-seeking investors; if you want a sport that knows what it means by “half-marathon” or “world record,” and an industry that guarantees fair conditions to those it employs – then read on. All these are, or have been, issues at a global level. Who has the right to decide them is still a vexed question.

I touched on some of these matters last year, when I wrote about the opportunities that were missed when professionalism was introduced in the 1980s (Roger on Running, “When Money Came into Running”).

I gained fresh insights last month when I was keynote speaker in Prague at the biannual world congress of AIMS – the Association of International Marathons and Road Races. Founded by 28 races in 1982, at the height of the first running boom, AIMS is the only global association of road running, and was established in those formative days as a way of exchanging ideas on race organization and setting professional standards in things like course measurement. In America, Phil Stewart founded Road Race Management in the same year and with similar objectives, and has achieved similar success.

The fact that you can be pretty sure your latest 10K or marathon was run on an accurate course is owed in great part to the measurement methods and sanctioning system developed by AIMS, whether or not the race you ran is a member. In my young running days, someone drove a car round the course, or measured from a large-scale map, and that was near enough. AIMS assured accuracy, and requires its members to have their courses re-certified every five years.

Another major achievement is the quality of medical support for races, with standards set by its sub-association of International Marathon Medical Directors. When a runner today has cardiac or other health problems during a race, especially any race that belongs to AIMS, it’s safe to say that they will receive well-equipped medical assistance faster than if they suffered the problem at home or work.

As the sport grew, AIMS added member races at about 10% a year, reaching 328 members at the latest count. The congress is attended by race directors from all over the world, and is an important learning and networking opportunity. The presentations, on subjects like “Sourcing Sponsors,” “Community Involvement,” “Providing for Women,” and “Canceling an Event” were expert and illuminating. Year-round activities include a website, the free magazine “Distance Running,” and a charitable/educational series of children's races. The latest of those was in Mexico, where more than 1,000 rural children earned t-shirts, medals, and a free meal.

My own favorite AIMS initiative is the sport's first international archive, the AIMS Marathon-Museum of Running in Berlin, very important if our sport's significance in modern world history is to be understood. (“Marathon Museums and Dr. Martin,” December 2011)

It's a pretty good record, from an organization that in its 30th anniversary year is also noticeably improving its act. AIMS has had its critics for failing to provide coherent leadership for a scattered and disparate sport. Its view of itself as “the major force behind the development of road running throughout the world” has an element of wishful thinking. A membership of 300+ is a small proportion of the world's road races, even though AIMS's influence in quality assurance, as I showed with course measurement, reaches beyond its members. Most of the developmental initiatives and energy have come from individual races, notably the New York City and London marathons, previously the Avon Women's circuit, and also from shorter road races like Atlanta's Peachtree or England's Great North Run.

In terms of leadership and the federated identity of the sport, there was until recently a vacuum. That provoked the creation in 2006 of the “World Marathon Majors,” an association of five of the most potent marathons. Mary Wittenberg of New York Road Runners expressed the hope that WMM could “connect the dots” with many other races, in other words take over the AIMS role. The difficulty is that other races are not inclined to see themselves as “minors,” and in the event, WMM’s main success has been raising the sport's media profile and provoking races like Rotterdam, Paris and Frankfurt to prove themselves major. Three of the five WMM marathons – Chicago, London and New York – withdrew from AIMS, leaving Berlin and Boston still prominent members.

“AIMS did a good job with course measurement but otherwise it was a gentlemen's club,” said one observer in Prague. The British journalist Pat Butcher (www.globerunner.com) castigates it as “toothless,” for instance in the case of a corrupt British agent who has been appropriating prize money from athletes, including some prominent Africans. Under its new president, Paco Borao of Spain, AIMS is showing a sharpened sense of purpose, even a willingness to engage with political realities that could bring back the trio of big-hitter WMM defectors.

By political realities I mean the relationship between road running and the IAAF, the International Track and Field Federation that writes most of the rules. The embarrassing screw-up in October 2011 over the women's world marathon record [see The Pacing Paradox, Jan 2012] came from a lapse in consultation, and a decision about marathons being made by a committee of track and field specialists.

“We had a little argument with the IAAF, but are now friends again. Everyone knows what is going on,” was the diplomatic but less than detailed summary of the controversy from Seňor Borao.

So I asked Dave Bedford, director of the Virgin London Marathon, and a driving force in WMM. Bedford is also the incoming chairman of the recently-established IAAF Road Running Commission, which is a strong new player in the Who Runs Running tournament.

“Our proposal got hi-jacked at IAAF, so AIMS and WMM worked together – for the first time – to overthrow it. Now it’s under consideration by the Road Running Commission,” Bedford said about the women's record issue.

The Road Running Commission that Bedford now heads is appointed, not elected, making its membership of nine more politically powerful than your average AIMS election could produce. It includes Bedford and Wittenberg, who control two of the sport's most influential events and many millions of its dollars. It also gives two seats to AIMS. That looks to me like a genuine offer of a role in top-level decision making, though not, of course, a majority voice. The power structure is far from settled, but it’s the Commission, reporting to IAAF, with input from AIMS and WMM, that will probably run running from now on.

That job will always be like herding cats. Most races were created by runners, so are by definition likely to be independent and disinclined to follow orders. I discussed with Bedford the way running, however big it grows globally, remains stubbornly local, each race created by local initiative, deeply rooted in its community, and wielding considerable influence there. Race directors are, I suggested a little wickedly, “regional warlords.”

“Yes, but any sport still needs common rules enforced by independent people,” Bedford responded. “Football [soccer] clubs are strongly community based, but they still play on pitches of an agreed size and shape and bring in impartial referees. Running already made major agreements on issues like pacing, the definition of unfair assistance, drugs, and the placement of drinks stations. Now we're sorting out the records problem. What I want is two separate world records for women, one in mixed races, one for women's-only races,” he said.

I may not agree with everything Bedford wants, but I welcome his cogent sense of the need to legislate at overall level, yet balance that with respect for the essentially local energy and local responsibilities of running events.

Greater clarity in how the sport makes its decisions can only help when new challenges arise. In the early days of professionalism, there was (as I showed last August) an unrecognized power struggle between the old national associations and the new shoe companies. The next issue might be the impact of new kinds of running event that don't fit the AIMS template or the sport’s traditional semi-philanthropic character, and have little interest in being legislated. There are new games in town like the Competitor Group’s high-profile Rock 'n Roll series, the beluted Warrior Dash races, and some powerful charity events. Check your running magazine for who can afford full-page ads. These are bringing in venture-capital backing, a profit motive, and corporate take-over tactics that could reshape the sport. If you doubt me, a few days ago Competitor Group took over “Women’s Running” magazine and the successful half-marathon series it had inaugurated.

Are these new players imaginative innovators upgrading the sport? or are they Monstro the Whale, swallowing everything? My concern is that without clarity on who runs running, it seems to be no one's responsibility to debate what they might mean.

This column is not making judgments or advocating answers, only showing that the questions exist, and that they are pertinent to every runner. My observations as a guest of AIMS and subsequently have left me largely (not entirely) reassured. WMM exposed the leadership vacuum, and the Road Running Commission (RRC) shows promise of being able to fill it. The sport will gain from the improved collaboration between the IAAF, the RRC, AIMS, and WMM. If that's as many acronyms as you'd find in an army manual, I apologize. But running running can be as complicated as servicing a tank, and it’s as hard to change direction when there are obstacles in the path, especially if every soldier on board thinks he’s the commander.

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